


Nost na Lothion

by TAFKAB



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Dancing, Elf magic, Father/Son Incest, Incest, M/M, Wall Sex, body painting, braiding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-08
Updated: 2016-08-08
Packaged: 2018-08-07 11:14:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7712740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TAFKAB/pseuds/TAFKAB
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thranduil prepares Legolas to dance at a Silvan festival, but the innocent ritual gets out of hand when a little spring magic interferes, revealing hidden desire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nost na Lothion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Elvesinmyheart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elvesinmyheart/gifts).



> This was written in response to a lovely request for hairbraiding turned to smut!

Legolas, son of Thranduil of Greenwood, sat still on his bed waiting to be adorned for _Nost na Lothion_. The month of May had come again, and Thranduil’s subjects made ready to greet the spring flowers in the way of Silvan elves of old. As their prince, a desirable youth now of age, he had been chosen to lead the dancing. Yet he had no mother to prepare him.

Thranduil had seen many young _ellons_ so adorned through the years, and had judged himself equal to the task. So he had volunteered himself, and now the two sat closeted together, preparing Legolas for his night of dancing as the sun sank toward the horizon. 

Suppressing mild unease, Thranduil busied himself about the tools of his task, maintaining a façade of slow, indifferent elegance. He felt rather clumsy and inadequate to the task at hand, though his fingers moved with confidence. The process was a simple one, for heaven’s sake, and though he had never done it before, he had an eye for beauty and a steady hand. What more was needed?

Wooden bowl, spoon, measuring implements. He kept his eyes on his work as he mixed the brownish powder with sugar, oils, and the acidic juice of a tart yellow fruit harvested far away in the south of Gondor. 

Legolas remained motionless except for the stirring of his hair, touched by a light breeze from the open window. It hung down over his shoulder in a golden fall, straight and unbraided.

Thranduil did not make haste, mixing the powder until its consistency was uniformly smooth, then spooning it into a sack of fine, waxed cloth, scraping the sides of the bowl to gather it all. He had mixed a great deal, though the cost of the ingredients was not slight. It would all be needed. 

He tied the small, heavy sack closed and tested the finely-forged metal tip at its corner. A small bead of the paste squeezed through. 

Thranduil set the bag aside and went to Legolas, who shifted slightly on the bed, allowing him to sit. 

“Mother would be pleased that you have undertaken to help me,” Legolas said, the first words he had spoken since they entered the room. 

Thranduil made a noise of agreement, reaching to his son’s hair and sliding a comb through the heavy length of it. None of the strands snagged or pulled; he could remember Legolas squirming under Merilindis’s hands as a child, his head a mass of knots after he had run wild in the woods and meadows all day. 

Their son’s nails had been crusted with dirt, and Merilindis had scolded him as she took him off to have his bath, while Thranduil sat behind and attended some minor matter that had, at the time, seemed more important than spending the evening accompanying his son and his wife to the baths. 

At times like these, when memory tugged at his heart, Thranduil could not fathom how mortals were able to cope with the knowledge of their limits: three score years and ten, as one text put it, though some lived longer and many did not see their seventieth year—brief human years; few humans could boast surviving an entire elvish _yén_ , not since the blood of Númenor dwindled. How could they bear to fritter away the time, consider themselves bored, lie down to sleep…?

Thranduil shook himself from his thoughts; it was immaterial. He had an important task at hand: now Legolas was an adult, a full-grown elf, and he sat still before his father, perfectly groomed, impeccably clean. But Thranduil had long ago learned the darker side of life in Middle Earth: the need not to waste a moment. They were all urgent, all important, for even elves might fall.

He separated the hair carefully, mindful to make every part straight, to make the sections even and ensure their correct sizes. This was by far the more difficult task he must accomplish, but he had once done it for Merilindis every day, and he was not unskilled. He knew how this braiding should go, and though his hands were hesitant at first, they soon remembered their old skill. 

Legolas sighed, tilting his head back, and nostalgia washed over Thranduil, a bittersweet tide. Merilindis had always done so when he braided her, yielding herself up to the sensual pleasure of his caretaking. Often he had not been able to complete his work; she would turn and take him in her arms—

Thranduil shifted, uncomfortable, as his body responded to memory. He reminded himself forcibly that this was his son, not his wife, under his hands. But they were so similar! Legolas had the same golden light in his hair, as of morning sunshine filtered through mist. He was even more beautiful than his mother; he had her clear eyes. On him, they shone between Thranduil’s narrow chin and broad brow, which somehow made them even brighter, masculine and strong.

Thranduil bound off the intricate five-strand braid he held. It trailed down Legolas’s neck, loosely gathering most of his hair. Now Thranduil could make the smaller braids that would twine around and through it. He let a segment of the smooth, silky hair slide through his fingers, dampening it to tame it to his will. 

Legolas sighed again, obviously enjoying the attention, tipping his head back once more. Thranduil swallowed, his mouth dry, and reached for a glass of wine that sat within reach on the bedtable. He took a deep swallow, savoring the bouquet on his palate. 

“Lean your head forward, _ion nín_ , so I may make the braiding smooth.”

Legolas obeyed, but that only served to accent the smooth, strong curve of his back, muscles lean and lithe and honed by his bow. Thranduil drank again, sparingly, aware that the masculine lines of Legolas’s body were no deterrent to desire, now that he had begun to notice his son’s beauty. 

It was wrong to wish to touch Legolas’s shoulders, to test their silky spring with a palm, so Thranduil once more set his hands in Legolas’s hair and began to twist the strands into slender ropes, making accents to loop over the larger weave in the center. 

Legolas made a soft sound, almost a purr, and it resonated straight to Thranduil’s groin. He anchored the rope he had made and reached again for wine. Perhaps it was unwise to make himself drunk at this moment. He sipped more moderately this time, vowing to wait until later to indulge. 

“Your mother would have wished to be here tonight, to do this for you,” Thranduil said, a little gruffly. 

“She would be pleased that you have offered to do it in her stead,” Legolas returned, his voice smiling. 

“I would not willingly let this duty pass to another.” He made a second rope and fastened it into the hair, mirroring the other. “You are my pride, Legolas. Were she here, you would be your mother’s as well.” 

“Thank you, _Ada_.” 

Thranduil kept his hands moving, separating the locks into strands and twining them together, all the while struggling with feelings he had not expected while touching his son. He had not expected to crave these sensations. Elves usually restrained themselves from physical displays of fondness, unlike men, who casually clasped any acquaintance to them as if wrestling or sex were the same as a lover’s devotion! 

Thranduil could not resist lingering over his son’s hair, feeling it slide through his fingers, its silky length kissed with Arien’s splendor. 

Though he was loath to release Legolas, he was also relieved to finish braiding, though he must now apply the dyes to decorate Legolas’s body. 

“I will paint your back first,” he directed Legolas, hoping to get himself in hand before he must face his son’s clear, direct gaze. He went to the table and picked up the sack, testing to ensure the needle was prepared to dispense the dye. Legolas lay down as he finished his preparations, sighing and arranging himself across the bed. 

Thranduil turned back and swallowed hard; his son had removed his clothing and lay naked upon the sheets, one knee askew. It had been many long years since he saw a young _ellon_ displayed so sensually before him, and the emotions it evoked were decidedly inappropriate, given this was his own son. He should not have drunk so much wine. 

Grimly, Thranduil made himself approach the bed. This task must be done, and to flee would alarm Legolas; it might lead to discovery of his wrong. 

He moved with regal calm as he sat, carefully picking up the braids he had made and laying them aside. His fingertips grazed the skin of Legolas’s neck: warm velvet perfection. Thranduil let his eyes close, cursing himself silently, and reached for the bag, preparing to apply the dye to Legolas’s skin. 

He paused, the tip over Legolas’s smooth white shoulder, and could not think of a design, thanks to his state of confusion. All he could think of was his hands on Legolas’s skin-- surely if he laid them on his own son, they would leave marks, accusing him for all to see! 

Slowly Thranduil laid his hand on his son’s shoulder, engraving the sight into his mind. Lifting it again, he began slowly to trace its outline, so stark in his memory. Each time he finished one design, he chose a new place he would like to touch and set the ghost-mark of his hands there, twining elaborate flowering vines between the voids left by the outlines of his hands. 

He was breathless before he ever reached Legolas’s bottom, but he kept himself in check, moving with resolute determination. A handprint curved itself beneath the cheek, cupping with both reverence and avarice. More trailed along the tender insides of his thighs. Thranduil’s vision swam as his breathing shallowed, until he had moved down to Legolas’s feet and finished there. He waited the requisite time for the paint to dry, struggling to compose himself. 

“Turn over, _ion nín_ ,” he commanded at last, his voice was hoarse, husky with lust, and Legolas obeyed him. He raised himself to his hands and knees, then slowly turned over, hesitant. 

Thranduil watched as he lay down, thigh spread, eyes averted. Legolas’s cock stood up against his belly, leaving a gleaming trace where it touched. 

Thranduil’s world swam and went red as the rush of blood through his veins threatened to overwhelm him. 

“ _Ada_ ,” Legolas moaned, yearning and surrender in his tone. Thranduil sat still for a long moment, shaking. Then he moved, feeling as if time had slowed to a crawl, and resumed his painting. 

Beneath him Legolas tipped his head back, his slim body arching into a bow, pressing up toward Thranduil’s hands. Gritting his teeth, Thranduil made himself continue painting, impassive-- but his work spoke for him. The hands he would like to have set on Legolas’s chest appeared there in elegant, graceful lines of paint. One laid its thumb over his nipple, the other caressed the small of his waist. 

Trembling, Thranduil skipped the center of Legolas’s body, painting smooth strokes on his thighs: a grip that would pull them apart to ready him for taking. Vines and blossoms filled the spaces the hands did not, curving with love around every contour and muscle. 

Legolas lay very still, the faintest whimper emerging from him each time he exhaled. 

Thranduil drew a many-rayed star at the base of his son’s belly, its outspread legs bracketing the soft dusting of silver-blond hair there. Legolas quivered, his hands closing into fists, his teeth sunk in his lower lip, every muscle stretched taut. His cock, swollen and slick at the tip, lifted in a graceful line over his belly, so hard it held itself aloft. 

Thranduil painted it last-- the curl of his imagined fingers around it, the print of his thumb captured sweeping over the head. Legolas’s eyes were wet, but he held himself very still, knuckles white, hands fisted in the bedding. His throat bobbed as he swallowed again and again, but he made no sound or motion until Thranduil had finished, curling the spiraling sweep of a vine around the base and making a leaf flutter at the tip, then setting his brush and paint aside. 

Thranduil struggled to draw breath into his burning lungs. Through all this he had touched Legolas only once; other than the first caress of hand on shoulder, only his brush had marred his son’s purity. 

He turned away to let the paint dry, slowly washing his brushes. The paint turned the water brown around his hands, and the faintly gritty sensation between his fingers sent a whirl of lust pulsing through his skull. He kept moving mechanically, forcing breath in and out of his lungs, but his whole being focused on Legolas, who lay still on the bed as the paint dried on his skin, branding him with the forbidden evidence of his father’s desire. 

He laid the brushes on their tray, arranging them by size, and put the remnants of the paint beside them, and the oils and fluids he had mixed in it, then carried paint and bowl and brushes away, setting them in a corner. 

He flinched when a hand fell on his shoulder-- just as he had touched Legolas, Legolas now touched him, approaching soundless from behind. 

“ _Ada_ ,” Legolas breathed, his voice a moan. His hand moved, a slow circular sweep, a caress, fingers creeping over Thranduil’s collar and burning hot on the pulse of his throat. “ _Ada_ , please!” 

Thranduil’s will broke, and a red haze flooded his brain; he whirled and seized his son, shoving Legolas up against the wall and trapping him there with his larger body. 

“Yes!” Legolas whimpered, letting him. His limbs seemed heavy and slow, moving to drape sensually around Thranduil’s neck; and when Thranduil’s palms found his thighs, hitching him up, they clung tightly. He pushed Legolas higher against the wall, pinning him there, and his teeth found Legolas’s throat, sinking a fierce line of bites along the cord to his ear. His cock ached; Legolas lay easy in his arms, spread out and ready, unresisting; with each new bite he uttered a low, guttural moan. 

Thranduil had no thought of spoiling his work; he could only think of the salt and copper tang of the flesh between his teeth, of the yielding he sensed in Legolas, of the tight heat he might claim. 

He fumbled to the side, groping for one of the oils he had mixed with the pigment, finding a vial. Clumsily he spilled it, running his fingers through the mess and bringing them up between Legolas’s legs. His son squealed as a finger breached him, clinging arms tightening with convulsive strength; Thranduil growled against his skin and fucked the finger in until Legolas’s tight clasp eased. Then he forced another inside, feeling Legolas’s nails pierce the thin cloth of his tunic to sink in skin beneath.

Legolas had lost all words; he could only cry out in short stuttered gasps. Sweat slicked his body. He was as slippery and hard to hold as an eel, and when he withdrew to grasp himself Thranduil lost his hold and Legolas’s feet touched the ground once more. 

He did not fight or flee, turning himself in his father’s arms and clutching the wall, the pale columns of his thighs spread to offer everything Thranduil wanted. His pale blond hair darkened where it stuck to the flesh of throat and back, stained red-brown where it adhered to the paint beneath. 

Beyond resistance, Thranduil lunged forward, and his first thrust sank him deep inside his son’s body, lifting Legolas’s toes from the ground and making him utter a shrill scream, his head falling back, damp hair trailing now over Thranduil’s shoulder as Thranduil fucked him, hard brutal strokes he could not restrain. He could feel it when pain turned to pleasure; Legolas’s body relaxed around him, the first shrillness of his son’s cries fading, turning to throaty moans and whimpers. 

There was nothing elegant or restrained about this coupling; brute animal need dominated them both, and Thranduil plowed deep with every thrust, clutching fingers marking Legolas, settling in the tracks of the paint and venturing abroad to make new marks, the red prints of fingers and nails. 

Legolas’s body squeezed him, coaxing him toward climax. Thranduil’s hips pumped and his breath rasped in his throat; even as he courted his orgasm he resisted it, dreading aftermath-- dreading guilt and shame and the accusation in his son’s eyes. But Legolas was sweet and tight and whatever he might feel later, he wanted this now, shoving himself down on Thranduil’s cock with pleading cries. 

He was hard too, and Thranduil’s hand found him, closing around his shaft and squeezing it in time with his fierce thrusting. 

Legolas shuddered and spent himself with a wild cry; Thranduil buried his face at his son’s throat, inhaling Legolas’s spicy musk and shoving his hips forward, desperate, into the fierce clench of his son’s body as Legolas’s climax poured out of him in steady pulses. He could no more stop his own climax than he could hold back the tide, releasing his seed into Legolas with a growl, his face buried in a hopeless tangle of half-undone braids. 

He held Legolas there, pinned against the wall, as the shudders of pleasure died out of both of them, as if his body could hold back time, as if he could shield them both from the reality of what they had done. 

Legolas calmed in his arms, his breath growing steady and even once more; sweat cooled between them, and yet still Thranduil stayed still, his cock gradually softening until it slid out of Legolas’s body on its own, his seed wetting Legolas’s thighs. 

Legolas drew a deep, slow breath and exhaled with a quiver, and as if that was some instinctive signal he had been awaiting, Thranduil loosed his hold and pulled away, steadying Legolas as he faltered, his legs shaky, almost coltish as he reclaimed his footing and finally stood again under his own power. 

Legolas looked over his shoulder to him, a hesitant, sweet smile; his eyes were glazed but warm. 

“ _Ada_ ,” Legolas breathed, reverent, and his voice held no reproach, only sated pleasure. 

“ _Ion nín_ ,” Thranduil answered, shaky. “I… forgive me. I do not know what madness took me!” The bewitchment lingered still in his blood, desire thrumming through his veins as he beheld Legolas, his belly wet with the stripes of his come, the paint only faintly marred by perspiration and the tracks of Thranduil’s fingers. 

Legolas only smiled, sultry and content, and came to him, nestling into his arms when he would have held the young _ellon_ away. “It is the paint, I think… as you put it on me, I could think of nothing but your hands upon my body, until I knew I could not live if I did not feel them there!” 

“Legolas…” Thranduil tried to protest. 

Legolas silenced him with a kiss, and when he drew back, his eyes were clearer, sparkling with a hint of mischief and unsated desire. 

“Never have I been had so well,” he whispered against Thranduil’s lips. “If it was the paint that overwhelmed us, then I will be sure to keep a supply of it near at hand!” He reached to the table nearby, backing his father away this time, and squeezed the bag, releasing a stream of paint and dragging his palm through it. Opening Thranduil’s tunic, he set a red handprint upon his father’s chest then, directly over his heart. “I have dreamed of you this way, _ada_.” He confessed, and kissed Thranduil again, his tongue a flickering flame. “There is magic in this ritual… perhaps the magic knew.” 

Thranduil turned his face away, ashamed, for he too had dreamed, and surely Legolas was right. 

“ _Ion nín_.” Thranduil lifted Legolas’s hand and sucked the paint from his fingers, slowly; the palm of his hand was red. Legolas’s breathing harshened, steep and fast in his ear. 

“You will have to make my braids again, _Ada_ ,” Legolas whispered, his voice warm and rich with laughter. “For I must dance. But when the feast has finished, I will return for more of you.” He set his red palm against Thranduil’s face then, marking his claim with wide-splayed fingers, and Thranduil stared at his son with amazement and with avarice, feeling the wetness of the paint against his lips, knowing his people would see the prints of his hands upon Legolas now mirrored upon his own face. 

“They will not speak against us, for it is spring, and the magic is on us all,” Legolas said. “Who would dare gainsay us in this, their king and their prince, who protect and guide them?” He kissed the paint from Thranduil’s lips, reddening his own. 

Then he turned back to the table, taking up the comb, and offered it to Thranduil, who took it as though in a daze, taming Legolas’s hair and braiding it down, pinning it in place once more until his son seemed the very picture of decorum-- if not for the painted handprints that marked him, and the proud debauchery to be seen in the way he held his body, not bothering to wipe his father’s seed from between his thighs. 

Thranduil was conscious always of Legolas’s eyes following him in the mirror, bright and sparkling. His son seemed almost to have taken Thranduil’s vitality into himself and made it his own. He felt helpless in the face of this returned desire, unable to resist, and Legolas knew it, the curve of his smile eloquent with unspoken conquest. 

At last it was done and Legolas turned, surveying himself with pleasure. 

“I will come to your bed tonight when the dancing is over,” he said. “When your own duties are finished, go and wait for me there.” Then he was gone, vanishing through the door on light feet, leaving Thranduil to stare in bewilderment at the mirror, which reflected the marks of his shame-- and his new-found glory. 

“You are truly your father’s son, _ion nín_ ,” he said at last, and shook his head with rue-- but also with fond pride, and with exasperation at them both. 

**Author's Note:**

>  _ada_ : Father, dad, daddy  
>  _ellon_ : male elf  
>  _yén_ : Elvish year (144 human years)  
>  _ion nín_ : My son  
> Arien: The Maia who draws the sun across the sky


End file.
